We have recently an update to your website that adds a few improvements.

Category Sorting - Next time you manage your category lists for discussions, blogs, etc you will notice a double arrow icon that by clicking on holding will allow you to re-arrange your category structure. By default categories sort by name.

Login as Member - Ever want to see how your site looks or functions from one of your members point of view? From the members profile page we have added a new option that allows the site creator to login as any user on the website with just one click, no emails or passwords needed. This function should come in really handy to better troubleshoot issues within your site structure and permissions as well as being about to walk a member through how to do something within your website! Due to the security sensitive nature of this function, this feature only works from the site creators account.

Manually Add Members to a group - We have seen this as a common requested feature. This should make it much easier to structure out your groups and further expands the functionality for this feature. To add a member go to the group members section of a group and start to type the name of the member you wish to add to a group into the box on that page.

We have a number of new features in development planned for release in the next few weeks.

If you have problems or issues related to the improvements in this update please make sure to report them via support ticket so we can correct those problems as soon as possible!

Today we have completed the last round of a series of end of the year updates to the platform, we hope you are as excited as we are about this latest update!

Over the last few months, our focus has been on adding consistency to the features and capabilities of the platform; before we develop new features that will be released next year. Consistency improves the experience for you and your members. This update process started with our changes to the Member Administration, moving most member management functions to the front end where you spend most of your time.

In our latest round of development we have improved 5 key areas:

Groups
With groups we wanted to deliver more functional, yet versatile features. Thus we have made two exciting new improvements:

Group Events - Enabling group events from your Manage Settings > Group and Profile Settings page. Your Groups can create their own events. This should come in real handy for better organizing local or regional events.

Group Topics Element has been replaced with our new Discussion System. The discussion system (More Details Below) delivers the same features to groups as with the main discussions feature. Plus, when members of a group post topics or replies all members of that group will get an email. To get instructions on the transition to this system, check your Administration Announcements page in your website management bar.

Discussions (Brand New Discussion Feature!)
The new discussions feature will phase out using the Topics Element in groups and eventually replace the forums system. The goal with the new discussion feature is to provide an easy to use, yet versatile discussion platform. Some of the features this new system includes:

Deep category support. This expands upon the existing forums that only allowed for 2 levels of sub categories, by delivering the ability to add an infinite number of sub categories. If you prefer something more simple you can create topics without worrying about or creating categories.

Nested replies, shows the reply directly under the members post with up to 4 reply sub-levels. We find this method will allow users to follow topics more carefully and allow for sub conversations within a topic.

Subscribe to topics - When a member posts, the member has the option to be emailed anytime another member replies to the same topic or when using Discussions within a group, group members are automatically notified.

Lock and Feature Topics - As a moderator or group administrator you can optionally lock or feature topics. This makes it easy to post discussion category rules.

Approval options, allows you to get a notice when a new topic is posted and approve it before appearing.

Set the viewing level by category so that only users with the correct access can view and enter a category of discussions.

Downloads (File Sharing)
We have completely re-written the file sharing system to make it easier to understand and more flexible. Some features include:

Category support! You can now arrange your downloads by category, and you can set if you want your default page view to be a full file list or by category.

File Type Icons, your files will have an attractive icon telling what type of file is uploaded.

New options to control if you want comments and ratings enabled for files.

Uploading is much easier then before with on page file uploading and editing.

Approval options to approve new additions before the file displays on the website.

Ability to feature files.

Member Subscriptions
We have enhanced some of the management features to make it easier to update subscription date and cancel subscribers.

Editing and deleting of subscribers has been added so you can manually change the due date of a subscriber account.

We have made some minor changes to the subscription signup page to make it a little more customizable.

Categories
We have really made some cool changes here, by giving categories more uses for more systems. Some of the improvements include;

Most systems now offer a category view option (Wiki, Videos, File Sharing, Groups, Chat, Discussions). The category view changes the listing to show categories first rather then the list of items. This will help deliver more organization to your website.

Categories now include a description box and will soon offer a who can view this category selection similar to the discussion categories.

In the near future we also plan to allow control over approving content by category. Thus you can have some categories where content is published right away and other categories that require approval of the topic before it is published.

Other improvements:

Email notification option on comment boxes! To improve the conversation on this feature, member can subscribe to all comment boxes, thus when someone replies an email will be dispatched.

We have also preformed a list of bug fixes and other improvements that should increase overall page load time.

We want to thank you for being a part of Spruz! If you have problems or issues related to this update please go to our support request page and open a ticket, this will help us track the issue better and allows us to collect more information about the problem from you.

Today we released a new update to the platform that moves all member management features to the front end of the site. The solves issues where administrators wanted to give access for more control over member accounts without having to give full site admin permissions away. This update is part of a larger platform update that is currently in development.

Here is a brief list of improvements and changes;

Profile Moderators can now edit all profile information on an account. This includes moderating the Profile Questions entered.

Profile Moderators can also change Privacy and Notification Settings for members.

Banning of IP and Email Addresses has been added. You can customize this by going to Manage Site > Settings > Manage Settings > Login and Registration. On this page you would list IP's and Emails of accounts you no longer want to access your login or registration pages.

Self Deactivation of accounts has been removed. If a member wants to remove their account you must do it for them or tell them to turn off the notification settings if you want to keep the member in the database.

Member Accounts will be regularly purged for inactivate accounts that have not logged into your website for over a year.

When using the search members box, the search will also search in emails. Thus you can enter a users email address to quickly find a user account.

We understand this change will be an adjustment for some. However we are open to your feedback if we have left out a feature you might have been used to on the platform.

This update is part of a larger platform update in the works. This update will be rolled out in phases and should be completed by Christmas.

Here is a sneak peak:

We are working on changing the permission systems in the platform for the old access level method, to using roles. Roles will add more flexibility in how you can structure your website moderation hierarchy, by allowing you to create your own roles for members and administrators

New Discussions system that will be far easier to use and navigate. This will also replace the current topics systems used for groups by giving groups their own Discussion categories.

Groups are being re-worked to better tie into the other features of the site. Including Events, Photos, Videos and Blogs. Allowing these systems to be categorized by the group member posting to them.

Like with any update, if you encounter problems or issues please report them to us via a support ticket!

UPDATE 11/11/11

Thank you for your feedback, we understand sometimes changes are released that do not agree well with some. Keep in mind that we release and make changes based on user feedback. While sometimes updates don't seem like an improvement, we must make changes to advance the platform.

In this latest change we see we under estimated the value of sorting members in the list. We have elected to return the backend member list. While keeping the management of members on the profile page.

Today we will release a new update that greatly changes how site membership is handled. In the past when a member registered on your site they registered with the Spruz Platform as a whole. The reason behind this was to make it easy for users to join other websites in the Spruz network, along with a list of other advantages (Spam Prevention, Platform Administration, Support, Etc). However this has proven to have some disadvantages. The main problem with this method was a member remembering they registered on another Spruz website. Thus when a user registered in some cases they would get the "You Already have an account" message. This has caused confusion for users of websites in the past and at this stage we would rather eliminate this problem. To do this we had to rewrite the membership core of the platform so that when members join your site, they are truly your members!

In our goal of improving Spruz we have removed Spruz Single Signin. Now when members register, they are only registered on your website and no where else.

By rolling this update we have added some new features that improve your administration over members.

Manually Adding of Member Accounts - Now from your member page administrators can manually add members. This should make things much easier for admins on private or invite only websites.

Manually Confirm Emails - In the past the only methods of confirming an email account where for the member to get the email and click the link. However we are aware sometimes spam filters stand in the way. Now the site administrator can manually confirm the email for the end user.

Reset Member Passwords - When viewing the member details of a member from your member management page you can now click the Reset Password link to reset the users password to an auto generated password.

Also included with this update are a range of other bug fixes and performance enhancements.